Anyone out there have an opinion on the new president-elect? Anyone at all?

I know that the election is less than a week behind us and it’s still about 70 days until he’s sworn in and actually takes up the reins of power. And there’s still what’s-his-name there in the White House, actually holding those reins right now and for the next ten weeks. But surely we’ve had enough time to get used to the idea of the new guy and start criticizing his performance. It is the national sport, after all.

This may strike some readers as levity, but I assure you, the critics are out there, not losing a moment. And I mean harsh critics: At least two “Impeach Obama” groups have popped up on one of those inane “social web” sites that I decline to name, and I found an online site from which to order “Impeach Obama” bumperstickers – $3.95 apiece if you pride yourself on your individuality but only about two bucks six bits in quantities of 250 or more to those organizing for action.

A plausible theory for such people would be that we know he’s going to do something we absolutely hate as soon as he can, so we might as well exploit this pre-inaugural period to gain some momentum. But a more likely one is that he’s already done it, by getting elected, by getting nominated, by getting through Harvard Law School, or for that matter by getting born.

What you just gotta love about the Web is how it brings the world’s morons right to you, relaxing there in your den or lounging in bed or peering at your tiny little phone while getting your Starbucks fix. Whatever did we do when we had to rely on the happenstance of graffiti?

(Of course, graffiti itself was ruined by the same democratic impulse that now besmirches vast tracts of InformationLand. In the earlier case the empowering technology was the spray can, for which we can thank in part a pal of Richard Nixon. Hmmm. Another such FOD was the felon Gordon Liddy, a pal of John McCain. But there’s no point in starting down that track.)

(And speaking of the wonders of technology, how long until Microsoft visits my computer in the dead of night to add the word “Obama” to the Windows dictionary, so it doesn’t show up with a red squiggly line under it every time I type it? See, it just did it again.)

Anyway, graffiti used to run along the lines of “Bird lives” and “Yankee go home,” showing that the criminal had at least the ability to memorize a meaningful phrase and then spell it. But now that it’s an art form and it requires only the ability to press down with the index finger, it consists of unintelligible visual gibberish, though sometimes it is nicely shaded. There used to be a minor street gang in Chicago called the Latin Eagles. Someone in the neighborhood bought his own spray can and went around amending their tags to Eatin Bagles. This was before the blogosphere but clearly anticipated the role of the blog commenter.

As Mort Sahl used to say, “Are there any groups I haven’t offended yet?”

Thank heaven, then, for the likes of Steve Chapman of the Chicago Tribune, who published this fine column the other day on our president-elect. Chapman is a conservative commentator who yet takes the peculiar view that a man who disagrees with him is not thereby rendered an enemy of the state. I’d like to buy the gentleman a beer, somewhere where there’s no WiFi.